You are a Lion
by crysren
Summary: Mary tells Bash why she left the castle and she realizes something important about him. Takes place in the forest several days after they rode off together, immediately following episode 1x08 and follows them back to the castle after Bash is apprehended on the run. Contains lots of highly emotional, romantic elements and a hint of spookiness in the blood wood.
1. Chapter 1

"We can rest here tonight."

Mary, bone-weary from days of riding, allowed Sebastian to help lift her down from her horse. His touch was fleeting—his hands resting on her waist just long enough to know that her footing was sure on the ground. Then he went about laying the campsite in silence, never asking anything of her, not even conversation. He started the fire and handed her that night's food rations, a bit of bread and hard cheese. The portion he gave her was always bigger, but she'd learned that it was useless to argue, and simply accepted what he gave her. It was all his food, too, as Mary had fled the castle with nothing much but the clothes on her back and a few strands of pearls in her pack. She'd intended to sell them. How ignorant she'd been then, how unprepared…in the woods, there was no one to sell such pretty things to, and no place to spend the money she might have gained from the sale. If it hadn't been for Bash she might have been forced to go back—back to the castle, to France, to the knowledge of Aylee's absence and the surety of Francis' impending death. She thought she might prefer to starve to death in the forest than face any of it.

If it hadn't been for Bash…

Standing the other side of the fire, his brown hair was burnished copper, his eyes bright and reflecting flame. It was misleading, that far away look in his eye. Behind it, his mind was whirring. He was listening to every sound in the woods, assessing the distance they'd traveled today and how far they'd still need to go tomorrow. He was assessing her, too, she knew, because he always knew when she needed to rest before she did, always sensed she was hungry the instant before she felt the hunger pains herself. Even now, as his eyes lifted to meet hers from across the fire, it was as if he'd intuited that her thoughts were on him, as if he'd felt it in the air.

"You can ask me," she said, quietly. "I think I can speak of it now."

He regarded her for a long while before responding, "I won't ask you to tell me anything you don't want to, Mary. If it's too painful…"

"It is painful, but I feel it would be less painful if…if I spoke of it aloud. I feel…I feel if I keep it inside me any longer my heart might burst from it."

He nodded, then walked slowly around to her side of the fire before lowering himself to the ground beside her. "Then I'll ask it, if only to keep your heart fully in tact." Gently, he asked, "Why did you leave the castle, Mary?"

She closed her eyes, searching for the words. When she opened them, her eyes immediately went to the hilt of his sword he was wearing slung across his back, emblazoned with the face of a lion. She knelt up and reached across his shoulder and touched the insignia. "Nostradamus and his prophecies," she said bitterly. "One about a lion fighting the dragon…that was you and Tomas. Another given of a girl, dead on the stairs, my ladies gathered round. Aylee." She swallowed hard, trying to forget Aylee's sweet face, surrounded by a halo of blood. "Both came true. But you know these things already." He waited, face unchanging even when her fingertips left the hilt of his sword and rested on his chest instead. "What you don't know is that Nostradamus gave another prophecy."

"About you? This prophecy…did he say someone was trying to hurt you?"

"No, Bash. In this prophecy, I am the one doing the hurting." She took a deep breath, trying to calm the clenching pain inside her chest. "He told me that if I marry Francis…" She struggled; saying it aloud made it real. It made it indisputably real. "If I marry Francis, Francis will die. I don't know how, or why…only that it will come true."

Bash said nothing, just reached across his chest and gathered up her fingers, holding her hand there against his heart. "I'm so sorry, Mary," he said.

Her walls were strong and had been fortified with years of practice at being a queen, a strong queen, but feeling his heartbeat beneath her fingertips, real and reassuring, had her crumbling. She looked away, blinking, her other hand covering her face so he couldn't see her tears.

"Mary," he said. "Mary." And he touched her face, turning her chin ever-so-gently so that he could look her in the eyes. "I'm sorry that you had this difficult choice to make. You deserve a better fate, a happier fate, full of love and laughter and fat children and peaceful kingdoms. But what you did was brave, and you have been brave every step of the way since."

"Do you think that I have made the _right_ choice?" a tear had spilled over and was making a track down the slope of her cheek.

"I don't know," he said truthfully. "But know this, Mary: I have faith in you. I have faith in your integrity, and your loyalty, and your wisdom. What you've done…sacrificing your own happiness for his life…it only strengthens my belief in you."

So used was she to being undermined, to being second-guessed, that his frank declaration startled her. "And if I told you to bring me back? If I asked you to return to French court with me, so that I might take my chances with the prophecy? What would you think of me then?" She shouldn't have asked such a thing—Bash couldn't go back, not after his mother's attempt to alter the line of succession, and especially not after being seen riding away with the Queen of Scots, his brother's fiancé, alone. Bash had every reason to never set foot inside that castle again, to be happy that she could no longer marry Francis.

But he didn't flinch. "If you asked it of me, I would make sure you were safely delivered, right back into Francis' arms, if that is what you chose."

"Even if that meant delivering yourself to the gallows?"

"Even then."

"You would trust me with your life?"

"Yes. Just as much as I hope you trust me with yours."

She remembered why she'd kissed him that day by the water, why she'd thought about that kiss every day since. She remembered why she'd sought him out, time after time, to ask his help when it seemed every other door was closed to her. She remembered the churning terror she'd felt when he'd lain near death on the infirmary bed, returning again and again to his bedside to be assured of the sound of his breathing as he slept. She remembered the relief she'd felt the day he'd returned from paying his debt in the blood wood—not for the confirmation of her own safety, but for the reassurance of his. She'd been adrift in French court, and he had become her anchor, without her knowing it. That was Bash as she knew him: he made things right, he made things better, he'd kept her sane and grounded in court with the same unselfish ease that he'd kept her safe and warm and fed here in the forest.

As she started to cry—harsh, body-shaking sobs—Bash drew her up under his chin and held her tight. Still with one hand on hers against his chest, he wound the other into her hair. "I'm so sorry about Francis. I'm so sorry that you've lost everything. I'm sorry," he repeated as she cried, until she finally drew away.

"No, Bash. You're wrong." She was back to being a queen, regal even with her swollen eyes and tear-streaked face. "I haven't lost everything." She put her forehead to his and said fiercely, "Don't you ever go back to French court. Not for me, not for anybody. I could not stand to lose you, Bash. I've made my sacrifice. I've given up one man I loved. I couldn't bear it to lose another."

She allowed herself to look at him, really look, and to hungrily take in every part of his face she'd never allowed herself to _see_. His beloved green eyes, so full of heart, the uncertain furrow in his brow, the strength in the set of his jaw. She loved him, she knew it now, and she'd been falling in love with him since the day she'd met him, even as she'd tried to convince herself otherwise. She loved Francis, too, the way she loved a happy summer day. But what she felt for Bash was different. It was the deep rust and gold of autumn, the stalwart warmth of a midwinter hearthfire, it was ash and bone and fear and hope and doubt and joy and life and death and ache. His chest rose and fell beneath her hand, his expression a mixture of bewilderment and disbelief, as if even now as she knelt next to him and traced the shape of his lips with her fingertip, he couldn't trust his own eyes.

"Mary…Mary…I…I'm a bastard. That's all I am."

"You are no such thing," she said heatedly. She drew him close, hands lacing behind his neck, into his hair. His sword hilt glinted on his back. Against his lips she said, "You are a lion."

This time, when he kissed her, she did not pull away.

******Thank you for reading, this is my first attempt at fan fiction, so I would love feedback! I am considering writing a few more consecutive scenes following this one, we'll see from the response whether I decide to give it another try. Thanks all!**

**I should also probably note that these characters belong to the CW show Reign and I don't own anything. The words are all mine (outside of the quotes from the show, IE Mary's "I've made my sacrifice" from the preview of 1x09 and Nostradamus' prophecies.) but everything else belongs to the CW and the fabulous creators of Reign. :) XOXOXO**


	2. Chapter 2

Bash watched Mary wake in the pink haze of daybreak, the first beams of sun welling up from behind the eastern mountains and spilling down into their camp like water from a glass. The soft light touched her cheek and gave her an otherworldly glow; she could have been made of ivory and gold, the work of a fine sculptor's hand, not a girl of flesh-and-bone.

She could not be real, this girl who'd said she loved him.

Her lashes fluttered and she stretched, brushing the tangles of her dark hair back from her brow. He kissed her eyelids softly, feeling like a thief; it still felt as if such gestures were not meant for him—as if _she_ were not meant for him—but unable to help himself anyway.

She smiled at the touch of his lips and put a hand to his cheek. Without opening her eyes, she guided his face back down to hers and kissed him, sweetly and slowly, until the ache in his chest became almost unbearable. He couldn't let it go farther than this…couldn't forget who she was, even for a minute, or he might lose himself to her completely. And he couldn't let that happen. No matter what they wanted, she was still a queen. It was his duty to protect not only her life but her position and her honor.

Last night, caught up in the spell of the firelight and the newfound truth of what existed between them, it had taken nearly every ounce of strength he had to remember that fact. But to hold her as she fell asleep…to kiss her…to hear her say his name with reverence…it was more than he ever imagined for himself, and it would have to be enough.

She opened her sleepy eyes, fingertips on his cheek. "Hello, Bash," she said, happy.

"Good Morning, your Grace," he told her.

"Mary," she corrected.

"Mary." He said her name like a prayer, closing his eyes. The joy and the pain, they were both so exquisite.

He lifted her to her feet, lingering for a long moment with his arms around her, before setting out to break camp while she brushed and rebraided her hair and then started on saddling the horses. Bash had just banked the fire when he heard a rush of wings above his head; somewhere nearby in the woods, a flock of birds had been startled and taken wing. Mary hadn't noticed, she was busy cinching a buckle on her horse's pack.

Stealthily, he went to her. "Be very quiet," he whispered in her ear. "There's someone in the woods nearby."

Her back stiffened. "Pagans? Soldiers?"

"I don't know," he said softly. "But they are very close."

Her eyes were wide and she nodded, hastening each step. There was a crack from within the trees, a snapped twig. It was even closer.

Bash helped her to her horse, not bothering to be quiet any more. "Ride, now! Go!"

They spurred their horses on, crashing through the forest as their pursuers made themselves known. An arrow whizzed by Bash's ear and landed in a tree. Mary saw it and cried out. "I'm fine!" Bash called, reassuring her. "Keep going!"

They were French soldiers bearing French arms. Through the passing trees, Bash recognized some of their faces. These were men he knew, men he'd fought alongside of. But they were enemies now and he was certain from watching the way they moved that if they caught him, they'd likely kill him.

Mary and Bash broke through the treeline, horses panting and more arrows slicing the air past them. They were being corralled, Bash saw. They were being hemmed in on every side. The only way to go was forward, and forward held little hope for their escape; it led to a high cliff overlooking a churning river. There was a chance, a small one, that they could ride the edge of the cliff long enough to lose their tail and head back into the cover of the trees. Bash focused on that, on hope, and let his instinct take over.

Keep going. Keep Mary safe. Keep going.

He kept behind her, knowing that the soldiers would not want to hurt her but terrified that in their eagerness to stop them an arrow might miss its mark. Better make himself an easy target than risk her getting hurt. But his efforts didn't work for very long. The terrain was getting rocky and her horse screamed and lurched, unable to keep its footing, Mary clinging to its mane as it fell. Bash urged his own horse forward, sweeping Mary into his arms and onto his horse just as her horse scraped and stamped in a cloud of dust and rock down the hill, leaving a trail of blood in its wake.

More arrows sang past them and Mary buried her face in his shoulder. His heart was pounding in time with the hoofbeats behind them. They pushed forward, until Bash knew they could go no further. He reigned in his horse and helped Mary down from it. "We'll do better on foot, we won't be such a big target and the horse can't make it up this anyway. They'll have to give up their horses to follow us, too. It may give us some more time."

Mary nodded, eyes fearful, but full of trust.

They picked their way across the rocks, the sound of the river roaring not far beyond, drowning the shouts of the soldiers. Bash kept Mary close as they climbed, keeping her steady when the rocks gave way beneath her feet, helping her back up when she stumbled. He prayed with every ounce of godly devotion he had inside himself that at the crest of this rocky hill, they would find a way down.

But as they reached the furthest ledge, soldiers collecting far below them like a swarming army of ants, they looked down and saw nothing but the sheerest rock precipice and the river swirling below. There was no escape from this place, no where else they could go. Bash swallowed the heat in his throat. This was the end. He had failed her.

"Listen," Bash said, brushing the wind-whipped tendrils of her hair that had escaped from her braids back from her cheek with his gloved hand. "Those are Francis's men. They won't hurt you. We can surrender now and they _will_ take you back to the castle, but I have every belief that you'll be safe there, that Francis won't let anything happen to you, regardless of what transpired between you."

"If _we_ surrender?" She locked her gaze onto his, not letting him look away. "Could not I just surrender, on the grounds that they let you go free?" She set her jaw, seeing the look on his face, eyes flashing. "You won't let me go alone, will you? Even after I made you promise you'd never go back."

"I go where you go, Mary." Bash was all heart and steel. "By now you surely must know that."

They both knew that if Bash surrendered with Mary, he'd likely be surrendering to his own death. Francis and King Henry both loved him, but they were both men of law and what Bash had done for Mary could be considered the highest of treasons. They'd have very little choice but to give him the maximum sentence.

Death.

And that was of course if the soldiers didn't kill him first.

Bash watched as Mary took a breath and gazed out at the wide, green river. "What would you do now, at this point, if it wasn't for me?" She lifted her chin. "Would you surrender?"

Bash answered honestly. "No."

The men below were getting closer, scrambling across the shale. Mary squared her shoulders. "Then neither will I," she stated, and he knew what she meant to do.

In one fluid movement, her hand met his and held. And then they leapt together, falling like stars into the churning river below.

*****Thanks to everyone who reads this second scene of _You are a Lion_. I was only going to do that one shot, but I kept thinking about that moment in the 1x09 promo where Mary and Bash leap into a river together, and I couldn't help myself... Again, Reign and its characters belong to the CW and the creators of the show! Thanks all!**


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

It was three days after they'd dragged themselves from the river, bruised and bedraggled, that they came across the little roadside inn. Their horses were gone and so was their food; they'd survived by foraging mostly as Bash wasn't well enough to hunt now that his old wound had reopened in the violence of their fall. And even if he could have hunted, they didn't dare start a fire and alert any remaining trackers to their whereabouts. Two nights they'd huddled alone together, in the cold dark. They'd kept each other warm enough, but Mary had not slept. All she could hear was the hitch in Bash's breath, telling her more about the depth of his pain than he would ever tell her himself.

"No," Bash said when they first saw the inn's lights through the trees. "Mary, we can't. We don't know these people. We can't trust them." He'd begun to lean on her more heavily in the last day, and though he tried to hide it with his leather jacket, she could see the red stain seeping through the fabric of his shirt.

"Bash, we must. You're hurt. And _don't_ try to tell me that it isn't worth worrying about because I know better."

"We have no way to pay."

"Yes we do." She touched the purse she still had, slung cross-body and over her shoulder. Finally, she was glad of the pearls and gems she'd packed with her. Finally she was glad that something she'd done could be useful. "It will buy us lodging and food for a few days at least, and its enough to buy the innkeepers silence should that prove necessary." She saw the hesitance still written on his face; he was slow to trust, but she couldn't blame him. He'd lived his life on the razor-edge of his father's favor and now that that favor was surely gone, so was any illusion Bash had that he might be protected by his half-noble blood. If anything, being the illegitimate son of the king only ensured he'd have a larger audience at his execution. She touched his hands, summoning her deepest sincerity. "I fear for you, Bash. I know you'd never admit to me how bad it is, but you don't have to tell me. I can see it. And I can't sit by and watch you suffer. What would you do for me, if our situations were reversed?"

"You entrap me, Mary." His green eyes were full of sad fondness. "You know what I would do."

"Then let me do for you what you'd certainly do for me."

"But it isn't you who's hurt, Mary. And I'm glad it isn't. Because it means I can still say no."

She shook her head, putting her hand on his cheek. "But you won't," she said, echoing what she'd said to him by the lakeshore so many weeks ago, the prequel to their first reckless kiss. She kissed him now, convincingly.

"I can deny you nothing, your grace," he murmured, his forehead to hers.

The innkeeper greeted them kindly at the door, a grizzled old gentleman with a nervous air. "We need a room," Mary stated, pouring the fine contents of her bag into his knobbed hands. "And something to eat. And hot baths, if its not too much trouble." Then she drew a topaz ring from her finger. "For our privacy." Quieter, she said. "For your silence."

The innkeeper nodded and motioned to a lone server to come from the kitchen. A girl, not more than twelve years old. Probably his daughter. He handed her the collection of Mary's jewels and her eyes bugged. "Take these two to our finest room," he directed her. "Run hot baths, bring clean linens. I'll bring up some bread and stew later."

The room was small but clean. Once the little serving girl had drawn a bath in each of the two adjoining siderooms then skittered out, Mary went to Bash and helped him slowly undress, first taking off his cloak, then his leather jacket, then his dress shirt. He cringed with each movement. When she went to help him with his undershirt, he stopped her. "Go in the other room. I want to do this alone."

Her eyebrows knitted together. He was trying to protect her again, she knew it, but whether it was her virtue or to keep her from seeing his wound—that she was unsure of. He took her hand from where it was poised on his shirt and held it. "Please, Mary."

She did as he asked and went to the other bathing room, where she undressed and let her knotted up sorrow and worry seep into the water. There was lavender scented soap waiting, and she lathered up her hair, working out the knots until it hung, dark and glistening, in smooth waves around her face. She dried off and put on her linen slipdress until she heard Bash in the next room, and she opened the door.

He was standing in the center of the room, redressed to his breeches, but he had not replaced his shirt in time before she saw it—the garish red gash marring his smooth skin. He grimaced, closing his eyes, quickly pulling his linen shirt down over his head to cover it, but it was too late. The image of it remained seared into her vision. She went to him, swatting his defensive hands away, so she could look closer at he wound. "Bash," she said, stricken. "How could you not _tell_ me?"

"I didn't want you to worry." Water droplets were glinting on the tousled tips of his hair.

"Lie down," she said. Narrowing her eyes she added, "That's an order, Sebastian."

He did as he was told and she went to a shelf where a few bottles of home-brewed alcohol sat, an amenity the inn provided to its patrons. She grabbed a bottle and then went back to the bathing room, where she acquired water and soap and clean rags.

When Mary returned to Bash's side, he said, "I tried to clean it as best I could."

"Be still," Mary directed. She poured some of the alcohol onto the rag. "This will hurt," she warned.

He winced as she pressed the antiseptic to his torso, and gripped the sheets with white knuckles, but he made no other sounds as she washed and dressed the wound. It was inflamed, she noticed. If they didn't stave off the infection, he could be dead within days. She prayed that this would work, that it would be enough to keep infection at bay.

"How does a queen know so much about being a nurse?" Bash asked, smiling tightly through his pain.

"When you were first hurt, I watched Nostradamus work on you," she replied, wrapping a clean cloth around the wound. "I was there nearly every moment those first days, when we were all so scared to lose you."

"And many moments afterward. I knew when you were there, always. You'd send your ladies when I was awake, but you always came yourself when you thought I was asleep. It nearly drove me mad. I constantly wondered what it meant."

She looked down, shy. "So did I." Her fingers paused their work. "I tried to convince myself that it was because of guilt—you'd only come to injury because of my country's need. But it was more than that, even then."

He didn't say anything more; he just gazed at her with those unfathomable eyes, filling her with a sharp, unrelenting ache. Overwhelmed by it, by_ him_, she closed her eyes and kissed him, then buried her face in his neck, still kneeling at his bedside.

"I love you, Sebastian," she said. In response, he brought her hand, held tight in his, to his lips and grazed her knuckles with a reverent kiss.

"And I love you, Mary Queen of Scots."

Their reverie was suddenly broken when the door burst open and the room flooded with soldiers, French soldiers. A man roughly grabbed Mary and pulled her aside, cold metal gloves biting into her skin as she struggled against him. "Get the Bastard," he told the others. "Those are our orders."

Bash was forced to his feet. "Don't touch her," he warned. "Don't touch her!"

"She's a queen," a soldier said, grinning. "Our orders are to let her go as she pleases. It's you the Prince wants."

"Bastard's gonna get beheaded," another soldier laughed. "Mongrel got a little too big for his britches, thought he could bed a queen."

"Let him go!" Mary cried, seething. "Unhand him, or so help me…"

"Our orders come from the Dauphin Francis. He is our prince. We obey him."

Mary watched in anguish as they dragged Bash out of the door. Once he was out of her reach, the soldier released her, saying, "If we were in Scotland, little queen, we'd have to listen to you. But we're not."

Mary ran after them, heart heaving. On the steps of the inn, she was able to grasp Bash's hand, briefly, before they yanked him again away. "It's all right, Mary," Bash said calmly. "Keep going to Scotland, just like you planned. Keep going. Don't look back. I'll be fine."

"Liar," she whispered, hot, angry tears burning in the corners of her eyes.

"I'm sorry," the innkeeper was saying. "I'm sorry, your Grace. They told me you might come. They took my wife. They had my wife. I'm sorry…"

The soldiers and their captive were already riding away. Mary felt fury rising inside her, real and raw and dangerous.

"You betrayed me," Mary told the innkeeper when Bash was no longer in sight. "I will make your life hell. I promise."

"My lady…" the innkeeper was on his knees. "I'm so sorry."

"You want to make restitution?" she asked. "Fetch me your finest horse. Now."

She'd loved Francis once. She'd run away to protect him and for no other reason, no matter how many things had changed in her heart since. But he'd taken Bash and left her behind, turning this into a game of revenge against her, with Bash as his innocent pawn.

Mary dressed and gathered what few belongings they still had, strapping Bash's lion-sword across her back, finding strength in its weight. Her heart and resolve were cold as its steel blade.

She'd go back to France. She would save Bash. Even if it meant giving up everything she'd once wanted to protect. Even if it meant Nostradamus' predictions coming true.

Even if it meant marrying Francis.

******I've used the spoilers about what happens in 1x09 to guide this chapter a little, with Bash and Mary getting caught at the inn and Bash being taken away and probably punished for leaving with Mary. The details and filler are all my own wishful thinking and speculation. :) Thanks for reading and leaving reviews, they keep me going! Can't wait for the next episode!**

**Reign and all of its lovely characters belong to CW. :) **


	4. Chapter 4

She approached the castle in a hazy lavender twilight, Bash's sword on her back and a vision of his face, marked with anger and anguish as the guards had dragged him away, locked in her heart.

_The fastest way out of the dungeon is through the south keep_, he'd told her once. If that was the fastest way out, it had to also be the fastest way in. Her plans were amorphous and still half-formed, except for one part. She had to see Bash. She had to know of his well-being, to touch his hands and his hair and to kiss him and know that he was still alive. Above all, she had to know if he was still alive.

She left her horse tied to a fence and made her way to the tunnels in the dark. She might once have been frightened of going through the tunnels alone, but not anymore. The fear had been burned out of her and been replaced with a determination so focused and fiery she wondered if she couldn't light her own way, so brightly was she burning.

_I'm coming Bash_, she silently told him._ I'm coming._

And then she was there, the tunnels widened and lengthened and she realized she was now in the dungeon, exactly as she had hoped. The guard on duty was passed out on his stool, an empty bottle of wine at his feet. She walked carefully around him and then went from door to door, looking for that one precious, familiar face. She peered through the bars of each cell, and was sometimes met with a returning stare, but the eyes always belonged to strangers with gaunt cheeks and feral smiles. She checked every door and saw no one she knew. Was Bash not here?

Heartbeat quickening as the bile of fear and disbelief rose in her throat, she came to the last door. It had no barred window. Instead, it was emblazoned with a bright red X. The mark of a traitor, doomed to die. Hand against the door, she whispered his name. "Bash." Her voice wavered, she could hardly say his name. She swallowed and rallied herself. "Bash?" she tried again.

"Mary?"

The relief that washed over her was so profound it nearly left her speechless. "Bash!" She said through the door. "Bash, please tell me you're all right."

He paused. "I am all right." But there was a break in his voice. He was lying.

She rushed back to the guard, who was still snoring mightily, and with stealthy hands procured the key ring from his belt. It made a raucous clink that echoed through the cavernous halls, but the guard did not wake.

When she found the right key and the door swung open, she could never have prepared herself for what she saw on the other side.

Bash was leaning up against the far wall, face bloodied and bruised, his arm slung across his midsection, which was soaked through with blood. He was covered in a sheen of sweat but he was shaking as if he were cold. Mary stumbled across the floor to him and took his face softly in her hands. "No, no, no. What have they done to you?"

Through guttering, rasping breaths, Bash studied her face with a fervent awe. "Mary," he murmured in his velvet voice, "I told you to…keep going."

She delicately ran a fingertip across his swollen, split lip. "And I told you that I loved you. Didn't you believe me?" Then she took stock of his every injury, memorizing them, stoking the angry fire in her gut with each wound. "Did the guards do this to you?"

He gazed at her with his uncanny eyes, but he said nothing.

"Francis?"

Still he said nothing, but she knew it was true. "He will pay for this," she promised.

"No, Mary. Don't let what's happened change you. Don't be angry. Don't let him ruin what time we have left together." He barely had the strength to lift his arm, but he reached and placed a hand against her hair. "I've wondered a few times if I didn't….didn't dream it all up. Even…" he grimaced. "…even now, I'm not sure if you are real."

"I am here and I am real," she said, choking down the hard lump in her throat, "and I am going to get you out of here."

He rested his shaking hand down upon hers. "Mary, it is too late. I am to be executed in the morning for my crimes."

"No," she said harshly as hot, angry tears gathered in her eyes.

"I cost Francis his engagement with you and I cost my father his hopes for England. This was inevitable." His eyes shone in the dim light of the cell. "I've resigned myself to it. But I never expected to see you again, and I thank God for you now." He placed a reverent kiss in the center of her palm. "I can go to the gallows without regret now."

She was full of hot, desperate fury. "No. No, Bash. This is not your fate! You fight, remember? We jumped from a cliff together! You will survive this."

He gave a sad, small smile. "Even if you manage to break me from this cell, I don't have much time." His fevered brow was fevered and furrowed in compassion for her. "I wish it could be different."

"It can be. We can run away again, you and I…and we could go to Scotland, and we could marry…and we could be so happy." She moved so that he was leaning against her, and his head sank to her shoulder. She pressed her cheek against his hair.

"I have been happy. Happier than I ever dreamed."

"I can go get Nostradamus. I can bring him down here to you, and he can heal you. Just like he did before."

"Mary, it would take a miracle, or…or a deal with the devil…to save me now."

Her mind was spinning with the impossibility and injustice of it. If he didn't die of his wounds, he'd be executed. If he wasn't executed, he'd surely die of his wounds.

She kissed his burning lips. "Then I will find you a miracle. Even if I have to make a deal with the devil to do it."

* * *

Her lantern's flame was feeble and tremulous, more useful in creating great, looming shadows than providing light. But she held it aloft with determination as she took those first steps into the Blood Wood.

For nearly a mile she walked alone in the dark, toward some uncertain confrontation that terrified her. In these wood dwelled the devils who had once marked her for death, who practiced human sacrifice as part of their arcane belief system. But her desperation for Bash had crystallized into courage inside her chest and she took each step toward the heart of the cursed woods with her head held high.

The rustling began as a far of sound that could have been anything: the movements of a small animal through the underbrush or the flutter of an owl's wings against the night air. But the sound grew closer and louder and she began to see the cutout shapes of cowled hoods as they approached her on all sides, encircling her, rhythmically chanting some pagan prayer.

She took out a small knife and held it aloft in her fist, as Bash had once told her to do if she ever found herself in danger in the woods. Then she dragged the knife across the palm of her skin, letting the blood well up and drip down onto the ground at her feet.

"I come in peace!" She declared to the swirling black forms. "I've come to make a bargain."

"A bargain?" A voice said behind her, onto her neck. When she whirled around, the black-cloaked figure had faded back into the blackness and another voice was behind her on the other side.

"What have you come to bargain for, little queen?" It said from the velvet shadows.

"You know me?"

"We know you," the voices said in low chorus. "We marked you."

Mary couldn't let herself be cowed. "I know that you can hurt people. Can you also heal them?"

"Yes," came the synchronized hiss.

"Then I need you to heal someone for me. Someone I love."

"The king's bastard," they whispered in eerie sing-song. "The bastard who killed our blood priest. Why should we save him? What do you offer in return?"

"I offer myself."

"A queen? Oh, a queen?" The words were bouncing all around the forest now, each coming from a different direction. "Tell us, what is better than a queen?" And then they answered themselves. "A king."

"A king I cannot give you!" Mary cried. "I have only myself. Take me as sacrifice. Give me the cure I seek and in ten days I will return to you and you can do to me as you wish."

"No," a singular voice said. "We will give you what you ask, Queen, and we will take our payment when suits us. You will not know the date or time we will come to call until the time is at hand. Do you agree?"

Mary swallowed. "I agree."

"Then take your cure to the bastard and wait for the day you'll pay for it." The voices were diminishing back into the woods. Mary turned violently around and found a black jar lying in the leaves behind her. She picked it up, wondering if it would work, and if it did, what the cost would be in the future.

But she didn't have time to regret her decision. She had one more place to go before this night was over, before she could return to Bash and make him well.

She didn't sneak back into the castle this time, she walked through the front door with her head high and went straight down the hall as tired servants scuttled and whispered of her unexpected arrival to one another.

She marched purposefully to a familiar door and rapped three times upon it, letting the sound ricochet across the halls, probably waking any who were not already watching.

The door swung open and a man answered, blearily rubbing his eyes as if he couldn't quite make out what he was looking at.

"Hello, Francis," Mary said, summoning every ounce of queenly bearing she possessed. "We need to talk."

* * *

**Again, thanks for reading! I wasn't sure where to take this story after 1x09 came about, and was even less certain after the ah-MAZE-ing episode 1x10, (because how could anyone want to improve upon the wonder that was Bash and Mary in 1x10...you just can't. They were absolute perfection) but I knew I had to keep this story going, so I did. Hope you like it! And hopefully I won't take as long to post the next chapter. Again, credit goes to the CW and the creative minds behind their show Reign. **

**XOXO**

**Crystal**


	5. Chapter 5

Mary met Lola and Nostradamus at the dungeon door. "Thank you for meeting me," she said. "How is he? Have you had a chance to see him?"

"He's going in and out of consciousness," Nostradamus said gravely. "But he's awake now. But I couldn't move him like you asked. He is in far too delicate of condition. They're supposed to hang him in a few hours but I don't think he'd even make it to the gallows. I'm sorry, Mary."

"Thank you for your efforts," Mary said, clasping his hand. "But don't worry, there will be no hanging today."

Nostradamus paused, as if he wanted to say something, to reiterate to Mary that it was hopeless and all she could wish for now was to be able to say goodbye to him before he died. But he saw the desperation in her eyes, and he didn't dare take away all of her hopes. He grimly nodded and excused himself.

"Thank you for bringing Nostradamus while I spoke to Francis," Mary said, her ears still ringing from that conversation. "You may go now. You don't have to stay."

"Bash has always been kind to me," Lola said. "He's my friend, too. I will stay with you."

Mary squeezed her hand. "Then come."

Bash was splayed out on the floor, shaking violently, his breaths coming in great, gasping rasps. Mary's heart clenched in love and fury as she knelt beside him, taking his head into her lap and stroking his bruised brow.

"Bash. Bash, I'm here." The deliriousness in his eyes seemed to momentarily clear.

"Mary." It was just one word, breathed with so much effort and yet filled with such reverence and devotion and that Mary nearly lost her carefully maintained composure. He tried to lift a trembling hand to touch her face, but he hadn't enough strength and faltered halfway through. She took his hand, stretching it out across her cheek, and holding it there for a moment, even as tears rolled down from her eyes and dashed themselves on their fingers.

"I brought something for you." Mary said. "A gift."

Bash swallowed, the delirium returning. "Yes," he rasped, his voice gone far away. "You were a gift." Then his eyes began to roll and he gave one long, whistling sigh as his breath left his chest, and then he didn't take another.

Mary fumbled for the jar in her pocket. "No," she cried. "No! Not yet, please. Bash!" She wrested the jar from the folds of her dress's fabric. The lid of it was emblazoned with the rough depiction of the stag's head and horns, the mark of the blood pagans in the woods. She twisted the lid and found a deep garnet-colored liquid inside, carrying the tangy scent of blood on it.

She felt cracks spreading across her glass heart as she lifted the potion to Bash's colorless lips and poured it into his mouth. Then she tossed the empty jar aside and buried her head into his chest, clutching the folds of his blood-stained shirt. Was she too late? She'd gone to Francis first because she'd thought if he found out she'd come back and went to see Bash first that he'd rush the execution in retaliation, but had she hastened his death herself?

"Mary," Lola ventured from the corner, her voice full of sympathy, full of sorrow, "Mary, I'll leave you alone to say goodbye." She stepped outside the door.

"No," Mary said in desperation. "No. He's not gone. He's not." She cradled his face. "Please, Bash," she begged. "Please." The desperate despair gave way to rage. "No! You are not allowed to die! Come back to me now. Live. Live, damn you, Bash! Damn you." But a queen can only command living men, she has no sway over the dead.

She moved her hands across his chest and then up to his face, tracing the hard line of his jaw and the sharp angle of his cheeks. Then, with feeling, she kissed his mouth, tasting blood. She squeezed her eyes shut and raced through every happy image she had of him.

Meeting eyes across the ballroom floor.

His words on the staircase as he'd returned her dog, _you're not alone here._

When he'd agreed to go into the blood wood for her, never letting on how much of a risk she'd asked him to take.

_Your presence brings light_.

And how he'd looked at her by the lakeside. _It's unfathomable. Francis has you, why would he ever look elsewhere? _

She remembered how easily he'd volunteered to ride away with her, simply to assure her safety, thereby forsaking any chance of his own to return to the court that had always been his home.

_Where are you going?_ He'd asked. And she'd replied, _Far._

_That's my destination as well._

She recalled the way he rode, straight-backed in his saddle, with eyes keen on the road and on her.

Then, with her heart shattering, she remembered his face when she'd told him that she loved him, there by their fire in the forest. She found the words again and said them, out loud. "I love you, Sebastian. My lionhearted protector. I will always love you."

Then she kissed him again, comforting herself with the fact that she'd be following him to the hereafter soon enough. Hadn't that been the deal she'd made, her life for this supposed cure? The blood cult wouldn't hesitate to collect, even if their potion didn't work.

She hoped they wouldn't take their time.

She tried to memorize the shape and feel of his lips against hers, but it hurt too much that he didn't return her kiss, that the warmth was gone from his skin. As she pulled away, thoroughly destroyed, she felt the soft break of his breath against her skin. Startled, she put both hands to his face and studied it, praying for any sign that he could…that he could be…

He took another breath, a deep one that lifted his chest, the sight of it sending her blood singing through her veins. His eyelids flickered and opened, and at the sight of his green irises, clear and unfevered, she felt the cracks in her heart mend. "Bash?" she asked, hardly daring to hope.

"Mary." Hearing his voice, so familiar and soft, made it real. In one moment she had experienced the deepest, bitterest night and then in the next the most joyous, brightest sunrise. She had been unmade but now she was well. She was whole.

He groaned as he tried to sit. "How do you feel?" She asked, wanting to breathe him in, to touch him everywhere, to assure herself that this was real and not some cruel trick of her grieving mind.

"I feel…" he looked at his bruises and blood-soaked clothing in surprise. "Alive."

She put her head against his shoulder and twisted her fingers into his shirt as one of his arms came around her back and held her tight. He murmured, "We have to go, Mary, if I'm to get away before sunrise. Look, the sky has begun to brighten." And he was right. Through the single, barred hole by the ceiling, the first tendrils of pink morning light had begun to show.

"We don't have to rush," she said. "You're still in bad shape. We need to take our time…"

"But Francis. The hanging."

She didn't meet his eyes. "There will be no hanging, Bash. You're are free to go."

He didn't understand. "They are letting me go? We're free?"

She swallowed. "You're free."

"That isn't what I asked. Mary," he searched her face. "What aren't you telling me?"

She met his eyes, heart in her throat, and he knew what she had done. Pain once again streaked across his eyes. "You made a deal with Francis. My life for your hand in marriage."

"I had to," she said. "I couldn't give you up to the gallows."

"But the prophecy…his death…"

"I will risk the possibility of his death to prevent the certainty of yours." She set her teeth, angry. "And after what he did to you…"

"I can't accept this."

"You'll have to." She kissed his hands. "We'll both have to."

His eyes traveled from her face to the ground next to her, where the empty jar of potion was lying on its side. She held her breath as he picked it up and turned it over in his hands, freezing when he saw the antlered insignia.

"Mary," he asked with wrenching anguish. "_What is this_?"

"I did it to save you," she whispered. "I made a deal."

"What have you done?" He struggled to his feet. He didn't ask what she'd bargained. The blood cult only had one thing they wanted, and that was blood.

"Please don't be angry."

"You shouldn't have done this." He was leaning against the wall, unable to touch her. She felt the divide like a blade in her heart.

"I did what I had to do," she said fiercely, ready to go to battle. "I did it to save you!"

"No one asked you to! I was ready to die. I had no regrets. Now I'm alive and I have to face _this_." He threw the jar against the wall, where it exploded into tiny shards and dust. "Watching you marry Francis…I could live with that. I could live knowing that you were all right somewhere, that you were safe in the world. Even that you were happy without me, I could live with that too. But this…" He sagged against the dank dungeon wall.

"It'll be all right. It won't be today, or tomorrow…"

His voice fell to a hush. "They are ruthless, Mary. Barbaric. When I think of what they might—" his breath caught. "—what they might _do_ to you, my blood runs cold."

"I won't apologize," Mary said. "Because I'm not sorry. You would have done it for me, I know you would have. And don't—" she walked up to him, staring into his face with all the ferocity she could muster, "—try to tell me it isn't the same. It is the same. You were happy to die knowing I was alive somewhere? Well, I am happy to die knowing you're alive somewhere. The difference is…" her voice broke. "The difference is that I know you're stronger than I am. I know you'll survive no matter what happens after this. But I couldn't, Bash. I couldn't. I am not as strong as you are."

He was stunned into silence. He closed his eyes and breathed. One. Two. Three. When he opened them again, his eyes had lost their flinty sheen. "I am not as strong as you think I am."

"You are." She wrapped her arms around him tenderly, still careful of his injuries, and placed a kiss on the line of his clenched jaw. "You are a lion," she said, echoing the sentiment she'd told him all those days ago in the woods. "_My_ lion."

* * *

**Thanks everyone for reading this! You may have noticed I did not include Mary's conversation with Francis...when deciding what to write I thought it more important to keep most of this story between Mary and Bash, and hopefully you'll be able to fill in the blanks easily enough. I wrote this chapter while listening to Hurts' "Devotion" (the demo version) so you might be able to see some influences there. I have at least two more chapters planned out after this, we'll see how it goes! Again, Reign and its characters belong to the creators and the CW. :) Leave a review if you like what you read, it helps keep me motivated to keep writing! :) XOXO**

**Crystal**


End file.
